Although many insiders and specialised press articles had predicted that Asian cinema would not be well represented at Cannes Festival this year, the result turned out to be full of surprises.

The Official selection (Competition and Un Certain Regard programs) and the two sidebar selections, Critics’ Week and Directors’ Fortnight, made their line-up announcement at the end of last month.

While heavy-weight (film industry wise) Asian countries, such as Korea and Japan, are totally absent from the Competition, the surprise came from Southeast Asia. For the first time ever, a Singaporean film, My Magic by Eric Khoo, will run for the Palme D’or prize along with Serbis by Brillante Mendoza from the Philippines, 24 years after the last entry from this country (Lino Brocka’s Orapronobis in 1984) in the Competition of one the most famous festivals in the world. Both filmmakers’ films have been extensively shown at the festival circuit for the past several years.

24 City by Jia Zhengke from China is the third Asian entry into the Competition.

In Un Certain Regard program, some films could be described or even called ASEM films.

There are a British film Soi Cowboy by Thomas Clay, which was entirely shot in Thailand, and Tokyo! a Japanese omnibus production bringing together three different directors, Bong Joon-ho from Korea, Michel Gondry and Leos Carax from France. The only Japanese director who will be in Cannes is Kiyoshi Kurosawa who will present his latest film Tokyo Sonata. Un Certain Regard will also present two Chinese language films, Parking by Chung Mong-Hong and Part Ocean, Part Flame by Liu Fendou.

Special screenings and Out of Competition have also chosen several Asian films: The Good, the Bad and the Weird by Kim Jee-woon, which is a Korean homage to spaghetti western genre, The Chaser a debut film from Korea by Na Hong-jin, which performed very well in the local box-office last winter, as well as a new version of Wong Kar Wai epic film Ashes of Times Redux.

Cannes sidebars which have contributed to the discovery of new Asian filmmakers so far are focusing more on European cinema this year. While Critics’ Week has no Asian film this year, Directors’ Fortnight will present Now Showing by Raya Martin, a 4-and-a-half- hour film from the Philippines and Knitting the second film of Chinese novelist, Yin Lichuan.